As a Marketing professional for many years and being around since the start of Social Media, I have learned a few things, I have seen a few things, and I have made my own errors.
One of the many errors I myself have been guilty of and see from my clients is the use of Social Media. There are a number of various Social Media platforms that companies and individuals are using to build business, stay in touch with family and friends and to reconnect with long lost family members.
These platforms each should be viewed and used differently. The audience varies from platform to platform, what doesn’t vary is how to use it, especially for growing a business. When you use Social Media to build your business you have one focus and one goal. The customer. The end-user. The potential consumer.
The one and only way to determine the customer, the end user, and the potential customer is through engagement. Engaging your potential customer with Social Media.
Social Media is a tool that can be critical to the success or the demise of your company. If used wrongly and not capturing the data that Social Media puts out about your company you aren’t doing it right.
Engaging with the customer, the potential consumer through your Social Media efforts will ultimately help you to build your business, and gain revenues both reoccurring and new through your Social Media accounts, all of them.
One thing I see time in time again is Facebook pages created, twitter accounts developed, LinkedIn profiles started. Then pushed to the way side. When you create the accounts, you are doing one of two things: you are letting your customers know that you are up to date with trends and that you are available for discussion through these platforms, OR you do nothing with them and your customers aren’t sure if you are even still in business.
It is important to not only monitor your Social Media accounts, but to use them. And when I say use them, I don’t mean post information or links and walk away. I mean engage your consumer, your current customer, your fans and your followers. If you post something, make sure its conversational. It’s discussion based. Open the dialogue between your customer and you. Use it for what it was designed for SOCIALIZING. Social is the key word in Social Media. Media is just the outlet, what comes from that outlet is Social based. It’s you discussing with your customers. Having conversations. Engaging them.
Know who your customer is and know what they want, and talk to them about it. Use your targeted audience marketing knowledge (I hope you have some, or have someone on your team that does), and engage them with discussions about them. Everyone loves to talk about themselves, it’s human nature. So talk to them, about them.
Social Media was originally designed for people to interact with each other. Businesses are people, they are made up of people. People like those Social Media was designed for. But many businesses don’t see it that way. As a business owner or executive you need to look at your business as a person. Your business should have a personality, it should have wants and needs, it should have friends (both close friends and acquaintances). This is a vital component of your successful implementation of Social Media into your marketing strategies.
You need your followers and fans to know that there is a human behind the walls of the profile. That the human nature of the business does exist and that your business knows that engagement and discussions of the personal type is what Social Media is all about.
So, if you aren’t using Social Media, I suggest you start. If you started and aren’t sure what to do with it, seek help. It’s okay. You aren’t alone. Many businesses need someone to help them. That’s where professionals come in. Someone who knows how to use Social Media for the purpose of building your business. You have to start somewhere and Social Media needs to be a critical component of your marketing strategies, after all there are over 4.5 billion users on Social Media platforms, don’t you want a piece of that action? Join the facebook group to learn more.
